 stick wind farms on the oil rigs, along with the mobile phone masts and solar panels and string wave powers networks to them
fit solar panels under the lamp posts to collect energy at night collecting the light pollution and reducing it further
|
 |
realistically i don't know what the answer is.
but having walked near wind farms there is the visual impact, and the noise of a costant hum, i did wonder what the strobbing hum was at first then turned and realised
|
|
 Radio 4 did a report a couple of weeks ago (and mentioned in The Indie), that we waste 40% of the food produced.
Fields of crops are left to rot, because they are imperfect but still edidable (sp?).
They mentioned a couple of pilots around the country where they are burning waste food to produce energy.
Apart from the disgrace we are wasting so much food when so many people in this world are starving, this seems a more reliable form of energy supply than wind.
|
|
if all the OM members that were at Buttermere in january had taken wind turbines plugged into batteries you could power the energy guzzling computers and mobile phone chargers for quite some time. and not worry so much about fuel bills or a wrecked tent.
|
|
 Small windmills could be used to top up supplies for individual properties, there was a guy in the newspaper who had done this, but it couldn't be relied on as his main supply.
|
|
 I would love to see more solar pannels on rooftops, they can be made to look like roof tiles and have a very minimum visual impact.
Nuclear waste can be stored safely if we are willing to spend the money on propper sheilding.
I will never forget some one from green peace( on TV) on the beach near Selafield with a geiger counter clicking away saying "look theres radiation all round here"
And many people would be sitting at home thinking , "oh yes she is right" and people like me who use a geiger counter on a regular basis would think " but thats just background!"
|
|
Nuclear fusion is quite a long way from producing usable energy - the last I heard, there were containment problems, let alone transferring the energy from the reactor to the national grid. Huge technical challenge which may well be beyond the capabilities of the researchers (however good they are).
I would like to see the case for local energy production - as local as possible. I suspect it would be more energy efficient (though more expensive) than large wind power stations. I have never seen figures for the energy costs of manufacturing and building "wind farms" and their associated infrastructure, but again I suspect that they are very significant when compared with their projected lifetime energy generation. The argument for power generation to be as close as possible to its consumption is similar to that for growing food as close as possible to where it will be consumed - the energy costs of transporting food and of transmitting energy are both significant.
|
|
By local energy production, I meant domestic scale wind turbines feeding into individual houses or small groups of houses.
|
|
 Jon, the increased capital outlay of such developments is usually (projected to be!)made back by lifetime savings in energy efficiency - localized solar/wind power should be at least A, if not THE, way forward. You'll probably be hearing more about 'green roofs' as well, they save energy (www.livingroofs.org if you're interested, no I don't work for them but think they're a good idea!). Oh, and local materials (mentioned in the Snowdon caff thing I noticed) reducing transport costs and associated energy expenditure. Lotsa stuff. Ken Livingstone has his faults, but he's on the ball here. And we all have to reduce our own emissions too... :-)
|
|
 I think every one should wear wind proof trousers which can trap their farts, and then all the farts can be deposited via the appropriate connectors to fart containers which can be used to power the turbine generators. I know when I lit one of my farts in California a few years ago, it kicked off one of the worst earthquakes for many years, and scorched land within a 5 mile area. Such is the power of farts. Of course the government would then have to put VAT and huge taxes on food, a tin of beans will probably cost £2 a tin, and a meal at your local curry house will cost an absolute fortune, But I do think that this is a more environmentally friendly, renewable source of energy then most of the alternatives.
|
|
 Look, I think the clue came in the opening sentence: "I read in the Mail today..." Need we say more. Quick fix, a mere 100,000 years-worth of pollution. Great to look down from Scafell Pike and see the dickheads trying to work out what to do with the latest vast leak of uranium and plutonium from Thorp. Get real, people!
|
|
Good news from the Countryside Agency, who have decided to support extending National Park and AONB status between the Lakes and the Howgills. This includes Whinash and the beautiful Borrowdale valley, so might have a bearing on the windfarm proposal. Problem is any formal extension will take months and months and months and therefore may not be in place for due consideration at any public enquiry?
|
|
